Spain in WW2
 

I am by no means a WW2 buff, but I was always curious, why was Spain non-existant in WW2? I thought they were a more important country than to be absent from a war that was taking place adjacent to them.

They were probably busy with the aftermath of their civil war. Spain as a country was too unstable to fully take part in the big war.

Does Francisco Franco rings you a bell? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spain_u...281939-1945.29

Basically, Franco decided that he really didn't want to be a part of a greater war since he'd only recently consolidated his own power after the Civil War. There were a small group of Spaniards that fought against the Soviets, but it really wasn't an "official" army group, similar to Americans that fought for the UK during the Battle of Britain.

Spain was technically neutral but Franco leaned heavily toward fascism since the Nazi's had helped him so much during the Civil War.

The Luftwaffe and other parts of the German military actually used the Spanish Civil War as a kind of warm up for WW2.

As did the Soviets. There was a very heavy Soviet presence on the Republican side, and the NKVD (later the KGB) was very active all across Spain. Interestingly enough, lots of the NKVD operatives were called back in the midst of the war to be purged, and there were several defectors who made it out, including a general who defected to the US and lived here until he died in the late 90's.